Wtf-film: cult cinema and video reviews

Columbia Pictures / Clover Productions [1957] 75′
country: United States
director: FRED F. SEARS
cast: JEFF MORROW, MARA CORDAY,
cast: MORRIS ANKRUM, LOUIS MERRIL

“Date – the 18th of the month. Sky clear, light clouds. Visibility – unlimited. Time – 08:15 hours. A CAB plane flies to the site of the previous day’s crash involving Mitchell MacAfee. On board: Four members of the Civil Aeronautics Board investigative team and a pilot. Time – 08:16 hours. . . another significant moment in history. . .”

The uncredited narrator for this film couldn’t have known how right he was. . .

It’s almost impossible for me to accurately account for the enormous impact this film had on me as a child – but I suppose I can give it a try anyway. My mother and her three sisters grew up watching this film throughout the late sixties and early seventies, during the heyday of television matinees, and had very fond memories of it themselves – particularly vivid was their recollection of the ending shot of the film showing a monstrous claw sinking slowly beneath the waves as THE END fades in over top of it. I, myself, grew up in the time when TNT’s MONSTERVISION scifi and horror marathons were truly at the top of their game. Knowing already that I had an interest in like films, my mother spotted that THE GIANT CLAW was slated for an appearance on the aforementioned network and, even though it was playing late, insured that a tape was rolling in the VCR to capture it.

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